Memories of John Dean?

Those old enough to know will recall John Dean [who ultimately spent time in jail] in the Nixon White House. He was Nixon's attorney.

Now, comes news of George Bushs' former White House Press Secretary "spilling the beans" in relation to the now infamous Valerie Plane affair - as John Nichols writes in The Nation "Scott McClellan = John Dean?":

"Scott McClellan's admission that he unintentionally made false statements denying the involvement of Karl Rove and Scooter Libby in the Bush-Cheney administration's plot to discredit former Ambassador Joe Wilson, along with his revelation that Vice President Cheney and President Bush were among those who provided him with the misinformation, sets the former White House press secretary as John Dean to George Bush's Richard Nixon.

It was Dean willingness to reveal the details of what described as "a cancer" on the Nixon presidency that served as a critical turning point in the struggle by a previous Congress to hold the 37th president to account.

Now, McClellan has offered what any honest observer must recognize as the stuff of a similarly significant breakthrough.

The only question is whether the current Congress is up to the task of holding the 43rd president to account."

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Mahler's Prodigal Son

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